In late June, Walter Samazko Jr. died at his home in Carson City, Nev. Samasko was a recluse who had told his neighbors a while ago that he hated the government and feared getting shots, but still, it had been a while since they had seen him. His neighbors, unknowing of his demise, called authorities because of a smell emanating from Samaszko’s home.

In came the cleanup crews, which discovered boxes of gold in the garage.

“At that point, we took the house apart,” said Carson City clerk-recorder Alan Glover.

They found gold coins and bullion, tiny dos-pesos, $20 gold pieces, Austrian ducats, Kruggerrands and English Sovereigns dating to the 1840s – enough gold to fill two wheelbarrows.

When Walter Samaszko Jr. died, he had $200 in a bank account. But as officials later discovered, Samaszko had about $7 million stored neatly around his home, the Nevada Appeal reported.

Samaszko and his mother had lived in the three-bedroom home since the 1970s, which is around the time they started collecting gold. Glover told the Appeal that the two kept detailed records of the gold they had purchased.

As for who can lay claim to the riches — Glover said the Internal Revenue Service will take a sizable amount in taxes — about $750,000 — and that the rest will likely go to a first cousin, a substitute teacher in San Rafael, Calif., who is Samaszko’s only relative as far as authorities can tell.

As much as he feared the government, in the end, the government still got a piece of him.

The Las Vegas Sun reported that Glover’s office found her using a list of people who had attended Samaszko’s mother’s funeral.